


In Name Only

by Queen of the Castle (queen_of_the_castle_77)



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Angst, Drama, F/M, Incest, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-02
Updated: 2011-09-02
Packaged: 2017-10-23 08:52:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/248486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queen_of_the_castle_77/pseuds/Queen%20of%20the%20Castle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He’d never been a father and he didn’t know how it was supposed to feel, except that it shouldn’t be like this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Name Only

It had felt as though she belonged with him from the second he’d laid eyes on her. She’d felt somehow _right_. He hadn’t identified it as something familial at the time. It still didn’t feel that way.

He soon realised that treating her like a complete stranger – or even like the dirt under his feet, in the moments that he was most determined to push her away – only made things worse. After that, he tried to start treating her like his daughter. He really did _try_. When it came down to it, though, she _wasn’t_. He’d never been a father and he didn’t know how it was supposed to feel, except that it shouldn’t be like this.

Maybe if she’d let him know who she was as soon as he’d met her... maybe if he hadn’t spent that first night admiring her strength and fire and the fullness of her lips before she’d confirmed the horrifying suspicion that only just began to occur to him far too late to change what had come before it...

Then again, maybe it wouldn’t have made a difference what she said without the memories and the feelings to back it up. ‘Dad’ was more than just a word; it was a whole identity in itself. Even when she referred to him by that name, and even though he could see that _she_ believed the truth of it, he still didn’t feel at all as if that was _him_.

He hadn’t held her when she was born. He didn’t get to see her grow up into this beautiful young woman with a heartbreakingly sad stare, or have to put up with her fits of adolescent temper and rebellion. Apart from something around the eyes that was easily ignored when Pete decided he’d rather not see it, there weren’t even really hints of her real father, that _other_ Pete Tyler, to be seen in her; he’d died when she was too young to really be influenced by him. She was part Jackie, and a much stronger part herself, and maybe there was even a little bit of the Doctor in her, but he saw nothing of himself.

Was it any wonder, then, that he didn’t see a daughter when he looked at her? He’d even settle for just treating her like _Jackie’s_ daughter, and to realise that she was off-limits for that reason alone. Still, he’d never been one to pay particular attention to logic when it came to his feelings. He would certainly never have taken up with a mirror image of his dead wife if he was all that bothered about things being a little _unconventional_ (or ‘downright weird’, as Mickey had once described their patchwork relationship).

He wished now that he’d followed his first instincts and stayed completely away from the Jackie from that other universe (he still hadn’t got used to thinking of her as ‘his’ Jackie, and maybe he never would). If it hadn’t been for her, he wouldn’t have snatched Rose Tyler into this universe. He wouldn’t be stuck pretending that everything was fine in the Tyler household out of fear that if Jackie ever figured his real feelings out, she’d kill him. She’d probably be justified, considering that he hadn’t ever let on for a second that there was anything out of place, and as a result Jackie herself was pregnant with Pete’s child. If she had any idea how he sat there in _their_ house and thought of her daughter when he stared into space sometimes (or worse, how Rose’s face sometimes flashed in front of his eyes, blanketing the sight of Jackie herself, in his least controlled moments), she’d try to rip his internal organs out with her bare hands. She’d likely succeed, too.

Even the threat of that didn’t stop him from letting the occasional accidental brush of his hand against Rose’s go on for too long to be proper, or from holding her in his arms under the guise of comforting her once when Jackie had been elsewhere and he’d been the one she had to turn to. He pressed a kiss against her forehead once not long after she’d been stuck in his universe, even, and was glad that she was still too preoccupied with the grief of her lost life to notice how it lingered.

It was a kind of madness, loving Rose Tyler. As much as he didn’t like the man, he still sympathised with the Doctor because of that. In a way, they were in much the same position. _He_ couldn’t have her either.

Or so Pete thought.

When the stars started blinking out and Rose volunteered to cross the universes looking for the Doctor, Pete could have used his status at Torchwood to make sure she didn’t get to leave. He could have kept her close enough to him that he could occasionally fool himself into believing it was something more, even if he also knew that she always had to remain just out of reach.

He could have, but he didn’t. Whatever other people might have called it if they knew, it wasn’t just an obsession, or a perversion. Pete loved Rose – really _loved_ her – and he wanted her to be happy in a way she hadn’t been for a long time. She’d been so different since getting stranded in his universe (which she still so obviously didn’t consider to be _hers_ ). The hope that was blossoming in her now was enough to remind him how she’d been when he’d met her, and how he wanted her to be again.

If she left it might be a good thing for him as well. Perhaps, if he was lucky, he could even mostly forget about her if there was a whole universe between them (not that that had helped Rose forget the Doctor). These feelings, and the temptation behind them, might well ruin him if something didn’t change.

He had a wife and a son. They should be enough to help him move beyond _this_.

He let her go, but she came right back like a boomerang. Pete would have taken that as a sign from fate if she hadn’t brought the Doctor back with her.

Maybe it was still a sign; a sign that fate was laughing at him. Given all the crazy things that had happened to him in his life so far, Pete didn’t doubt that at all.

In the end, Pete decided he’d better just get used to the idea of always having a part of himself that wondered, and wished, and fantasised. If he could just keep it to himself, it might only be a _minor_ form of torture, as opposed to what Jackie would visit on him.

It was possible that Rose would never figure out the truth behind the way he looked at her. It was the sort of thing that probably wouldn’t ever occur to her. Even Jackie, who’d always constantly suspected him of taking up with every woman he looked at for more than two seconds at length (or at least _his_ Jackie had) might never grasp it because she thought he had a different and legitimate reason to stare at Rose. The Doctor, though, watched him with hard eyes filled with all sorts of terrifying knowledge, and Pete couldn’t help but think that _he_ at least suspected. He’d seen the whole of time and space, if Rose was to be believed. This probably didn’t seem so very strange or unlikely in comparison. He never said a word, though, either uncertain of his own intuition or, more likely, unwilling point it out as long as Pete never did anything to prove him right.

So Pete was left to his silence. He’d have to be content with that.

~FIN~


End file.
